Christ as the reality of the good land has been allotted to all the saints as their portion for their enjoyment; we have been rooted and grounded in Him, and now we need to walk according to the Spirit to enjoy the good land.
This week we come to the matter of, The All-inclusive Christ Being the Allotted Portion of the Saints, according to God’s Choice, as Their Divine Inheritance for Their Enjoyment, as seen in Num. 32.
We need to first see that the all-inclusive Christ is the allotted portion of the saints; He is the divine possession that God has prepared for us. Then, we need to see something concerning our preference and choice in the matter of the pre-arrangement of God.
God gave the land to Israel; He promised it to their forefathers, but since He was an orderly and wise God, He had a particular way to distribute the good land.
This particular arrangement and situation actually embodies a lot of crucial lessons for us as believers who live the church life today; we need to learn from this somewhat negative type what to do in our possessing the good land.
In Col. 2:6-7 we see that we need to walk in Christ, having received Him, and having been rooted and being built up in Him. Being rooted in Christ speaks of the fact that we as plants have been planted in the soil of the good land, and we have been rooted in Him.
We need to have a root life, that is, we need to enjoy the riches of the all-inclusive Christ by absorbing these riches to be built up in Him. Being built up in Christ is growing in Him, and by our growing in Him, more of Him is added to us so that we may grow with the growth of God.
When we all grow in Christ and are built up in Him, we collectively can become the Body of Christ, and we can build up the Body of Christ.
For us to have this experience we need to have much absorbing of what Christ is. In regards to crossing the river Jordan to enter into the good land, many believers think that Jordan refers to death, and after we die, we enter into heaven where we enjoy Christ forever.
But this is not the thought of the Bible; rather, the Bible speaks of crossing the river Jordan and entering into the possession and enjoyment of the all-inclusive good land, which is a type of Christ.
The all-inclusive Christ has been given to us by God; He has been promised and allotted to us by God for our possession and enjoyment with all the saints.
The All-Inclusive Christ has been Allotted to us to be our Portion for our Enjoyment
The all-inclusive Christ is typified by the good land in Deut. 8:9; this land is a land in which we will lack nothing.
Paul expounds on this in Col. 1:12 where He says that God has qualified us for a share of the allotted portion of the saints in the light; Christ has been allotted to us to be our portion for our enjoyment.
Christ as the allotted portion of the saints refers to the lot of the inheritance, as illustrated by the allotment of the good land of Canaan given to the children of Israel for their inheritance (Josh. 14:1).
Each one of them has been given a lot, a portion, a parcel of their inheritance; the good land was not just given to the children of Israel in a general way but each of them, by tribes and by families, were given an inheritance by lot.
The children of Israel didn’t belong in Egypt or in the wilderness; they were called to possess the good land that God has promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, so that they may inherit it.
We believers in Christ do not belong to this world; we belong to God, and God has given us the all-inclusive Christ as our allotted portion for us to enjoy and partake of for our possession and enjoyment.
What are we doing here on earth, and what is our Christian life with its pursuit? We are here to gain Christ.
Paul testified of this in Phil. 3, for he saw the good land in reality and he counted all things as loss – everything that he previously considered as gain, now he counted loss, even paying the price of suffering the loss of all things on account of Christ.
The things that were once dear to him, his attainments in his fathers’ religion, and everything he considered as gain, now he counted as loss, filth, garbage, trash, and refuse.
The only way we can count our attainments and gains to be refuse is if we see and gain something better, something more worthy.
Paul saw the all-inclusive Christ, and his whole life was a journey for him to gain this Christ in every possible way, even to attain the goal of the high calling of God – the full gaining and enjoyment of Christ.
We believers in Christ have been called to reach the goal and gain the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus, which is the enjoyment of the all-inclusive Christ of God whom God has allotted to us to be our portion for our enjoyment.
Our inheritance as New Testament believers is not a physical land – it is the all-inclusive Christ, for He is the pledge of our inheritance (Eph. 1:14).
Christ is the allotted portion of the saints as our divine inheritance for our enjoyment (Acts 26:18). Today we enjoy a pledge, a sample, of a certain full taste coming in the millennium.
The Spirit was given to us as a sample, a pledge of the full taste, and the Spirit that seals us is a guarantee of the all-inclusive Christ whom we will enjoy in full one day.
God’s intention is to bring all His people into the good land, which typifies Christ as the goal; in the Old Testament we see how God’s people journeyed and then arrived at the goal, but in the New Testament we – the believers – having been baptized into Christ, are already in the goal (Rom. 6:3; Gal. 3:27; 1 Cor. 1:30; Col. 2:6 and footnotes).
Hallelujah, we are here in Christ already, and our goal and pursuit on earth is to enjoy the Christ who has been allotted to us! We have been joined and mingled with Christ, even one with Him, and now we just need to enjoy Him and gain Him!
Hallelujah, the Father has qualified us for a share of the allotted portion of the saints in the light, which is the all-inclusive Christ! Thank You Lord for Your intention to bring us into the full enjoyment and possession of the all-inclusive Christ as the reality of the good land. Thank You for allotting us a portion for our divine inheritance and our enjoyment. Amen, Lord, we give ourselves to You to enjoy You as the good land. We want to enjoy our allotted portion, the all-inclusive Christ, so that we may enter into our inheritance!
Spending Time in the Word to be Deeply Rooted in Christ and Walk in Him as the Good Land
Having seen that we have been allotted a portion of the all-inclusive Christ as our inheritance for our enjoyment, we need to daily exercise to enjoy the Lord and partake of Him.
When we contact the Lord and spend time in the Word with much prayer, we become deeply rooted in Christ.
On one hand God has already planted us in Christ as the all-inclusive good land, and on the other, we need to daily spend time in the Word of God with much prayer so that we may be deeply rooted in Him.
When we spend time with the Lord in His word with much prayer, we absorb the riches of Christ in His word, and we will walk in Him. Then something will happen in our inward being which will cause us to have a particular kind of walk – we will walk in Christ as the good land.
When we spend time in the Word with much prayer, we become rooted in Christ, and we don’t need to make up our mind to do certain things – we will spontaneously walk in Christ.
The more we contact the Lord as the rich soil into which we have been rooted, the more we are filled with His riches; then, something will take place in our inward being to change us and transform us, and we will walk in Christ.
First we need to grow downward into Christ, sending roots into Him daily in our personal and private time with Him in the word, and then we need to grow upward, having a walk in Christ.
We are already rooted in our culture; by our growing up in a certain family and society, we acquire a certain culture, and we are rooted in it; even the little children are being rooted in the culture.
If we take time to enjoy the Lord, if we daily spend time with Him in His word to enjoy Him and absorb His riches, we will be rooted in Him, we will absorb His riches, and we will walk in Him.
We may have heard and read so much about our all-inclusive Christ, and we may even have a vast knowledge of what He is and has done for us; what we need to do is take time to absorb Him.
We need to spend time in the Word with much prayer and musing so that the Christ in whom we’re rooted would be absorbed into us, and we will walk in Him.
If we spend time with the Lord in His word, the elements of the rich Christ will be absorbed into us, and we will become a different kind of person – we become a person who is rooted in Christ, built up in Christ, and walking in Christ.
Oh, what a Christ we have! How much we need to spend time with Him in His word to absorb His riches!
This article can also be read in the Romanian language / Citiți acest articol în limba română vizitând următorul link, Cristosul atotinclusiv ne-a fost repartizat: să fim înrădăcinați în El și să umblăm în El.
Lord Jesus, we give ourselves to You to spend time with You in Your word with much prayer so that we may absorb Your riches and be deeply rooted into You. Amen, Lord, we don’t want to merely know about the all-inclusive Christ but take adequate time to be in the Word and send roots deep down into the rich Christ! Lord Jesus, may we have much growth downward in Christ so that we may also grow upward in Him, having a walk in Christ. May we be deeply rooted in Christ so that we may live, walk, act, and have our whole being in Him!
References and Hymns on this Topic
- Inspiration: the Word of God, my enjoyment in the ministry, the message by bro. Minoru Chen for this week, and portions from, Life-study of Colossians, msgs. 46-47 (by Witness Lee), 10-11, as quoted in the Holy Word for Morning Revival on, Crystallization-Study of Numbers (2), week 7, The All-inclusive Christ Being the Allotted Portion of the Saints, according to God’s Choice, as Their Divine Inheritance for Their Enjoyment.
- Hymns on this topic:
# Jesus, the all-inclusive land, / Is everything to me: / A Christ of brooks, of depths and streams, / And fountains bubbling free. / Springing from valleys and from hills, / Flowing till every part He fills, / He waters us—how glorious— / By His life! (Hymns #1164)
# What a Christ we have, the all-inclusive One, / Our allotted portion, set apart in light. / In the kingdom of the Son of God, the Son of God’s love, / Here He rules us in the light of His love. (Song on, What a Christ We Have)
# Take time to absorb Him, to gain the supply, / That we may be watered and nourished thereby; / The deeper the roots spread, the deeper the flow, / And richer and higher within us He’ll grow. (Song on, Take time to absorb Him)
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